Malayalam author and film director C. Radhakrishnan quit as an “eminent writer” of the Sahitya Akademi on Monday in protest against junior culture minister Arjun Meghwal inaugurating the annual Festival of Letters in recent years.

Radhakrishnan has been a member of the Akademi’s general council and the convener of its Malayalam advisory board since last year. Consequent to his resignation, he ceased to hold these posts as well, he told The Telegraph.

He said that he had complained to the secretary about the minister inaugurating last year’s event and was assured that it wouldn’t happen this year. However, Meghwal inaugurated the event on March 11.

“I am 85 now and I don’t want to waste time there if the Akademi is run this way. I resigned as a protest,” he said.

Radhakrishnan said in his resignation: “I strongly protest against this year’s Akademi Festival having been inaugurated by a cabinet minister of the Government of India, a person without any known credential whatsoever in literature….”

In a statement, the Akademi said: “Sri Madhav Kaushik (Akademi president) firmly said that this is entirely wrong, for Sri Arjun Ram Meghwal, Hon’ble Minister of State for Culture, Government of India, is himself a writer…. The fact is that many a Minister, irrespective of any political parties, have participated in the Akademi’s literary programmes in the past too, and which certainly in no way violates the Akademi’s autonomy.”